The 20th anniversary of Pavel Bure’s first game as a Canuck was this past Saturday. Trevor Linden may be the greatest Canuck of all time, but Pavel was the best. At his peak, he made you want to catch every second of Canucks games (sure would be nice to have him on the team nowadays for those Minnesota divisional games…). Throughout his career, he was the fastest and most powerful skater in the league. He had Sidney Crosby’s strength and Marian Gaborik’s acceleration (and then some), combined with Alex Ovechkin’s hunger for scoring goals.

That's how the old saying goes, and with the news coming out today that Pavel Bure is going to be a Hockey Hall of Fame inductee, the Vancouver Canucks decision not to say anything for three and a half hours regarding Bure's induction is suspicious to say the least.

We've now known for nearly three hours that Pavel Bure - after being snubbed 6 previous times - was selected for induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame. Yet we've heard nothing, not a peep from Canucks.nhl.com, or the @VanCanucks Twitter feed, and fans in the digital space are outraged. (Update: The Canucks have issued a Press Release congratulating Pavel Bure, along with Mats Sundin. Here's the link. I stand by everything said in this article, this is a poor way to congratulate Bure, and I think the team whiffed big time on handling this appropriately.).

As first broken by the Score Ticker twitter account (tweet embedded below) - after six kicks at the can and six misses - former Canucks sniper Pavel "The Russian Rocket" Bure, one of the most electrifying players in NHL history, will be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame this year. He'll join Burnaby born Joe Sakic, former Vancouver Canucks power forward Mats Sundin and newly minted Washington Capitals coach Adam Oates in the 2012 induction class. That's some fine company to go in with!

Here's the tweet that first informed Canucks fans of the news:

Joe Sakic, Adam Oates, Mats Sundin and Pavel Bure have been elected into the Hockey Hall of Fame.